Many years ago when advance-fee email scams [0] became common I was likewise amazed that anyone would fall for them. Then it was pointed out that the seemingly obvious warning signs were a feature and not a bug, they are there to filter out everyone with a minimum of common sense and ensure that the scammers, who are casting their nets wide, only get responses from a few people but those people who do respond are quite gullible. The pig butchering thing is just a different filter meant to trap a different kind of vulnerable person.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advance-fee_scam

If only that was true. In reality, outside of the more online-fraud-savvy demographics...

This thread is the first I've heard of it. I had to look it up.

The scammer convinces the mark to put money into fake investments and escalates until the mark runs of of money or gets spooked, then disappears. It's often made more persuasive by engaging in a fake romance.

I have literally never heard of it before this thread.